Marius replaced them in their envelope, flung the whole into a corner and went to bed.
About seven o’clock in the morning, he had just risen and breakfasted, and was trying to settle down to work, when there came a soft knock at his door.
As he owned nothing, he never locked his door, unless occasionally, though very rarely, when he was engaged in some pressing work.
Even when absent he left his key in the lock.
“You will be robbed,” said Ma’am Bougon.
“Of what?” said Marius.
The truth is, however, that he had, one day, been robbed of an old pair of boots, to the great triumph of Ma’am Bougon.
There came a second knock, as gentle as the first.
“Come in,” said Marius.
The door opened.
“What do you want, Ma’am Bougon?” asked Marius, without raising his eyes from the books and manuscripts on his table.
A voice which did not belong to Ma’am Bougon replied:— “Excuse me, sir—”
It was a dull, broken, hoarse, strangled voice, the voice of an old man, roughened with brandy and liquor.
Marius turned round hastily, and beheld a young girl.
CHAPTER IV—A ROSE IN MISERY
A very young girl was standing in the half-open door.
The dormer window of the garret, through which the light fell, was precisely opposite the door, and illuminated the figure with a wan light.
She was a frail, emaciated, slender creature; there was nothing but a chemise and a petticoat upon that chilled and shivering nakedness.
Her girdle was a string, her head ribbon a string, her pointed shoulders emerged from her chemise, a blond and lymphatic pallor, earth-colored collar-bones, red hands, a half-open and degraded mouth, missing teeth, dull, bold, base eyes; she had the form of a young girl who has missed her youth, and the look of a corrupt old woman; fifty years mingled with fifteen; one of those beings which are both feeble and horrible, and which cause those to shudder whom they do not cause to weep.
Marius had risen, and was staring in a sort of stupor at this being, who was almost like the forms of the shadows which traverse dreams.
The most heart-breaking thing of all was, that this young girl had not come into the world to be homely.
In her early childhood she must even have been pretty.
The grace of her age was still struggling against the hideous, premature decrepitude of debauchery and poverty.
The remains of beauty were dying away in that face of sixteen, like the pale sunlight which is extinguished under hideous clouds at dawn on a winter’s day.
That face was not wholly unknown to Marius.
He thought he remembered having seen it somewhere.
“What do you wish, Mademoiselle?” he asked.
The young girl replied in her voice of a drunken convict:— “Here is a letter for you, Monsieur Marius.”
She called Marius by his name; he could not doubt that he was the person whom she wanted; but who was this girl?
How did she know his name?
Without waiting for him to tell her to advance, she entered.
She entered resolutely, staring, with a sort of assurance that made the heart bleed, at the whole room and the unmade bed.
Her feet were bare.
Large holes in her petticoat permitted glimpses of her long legs and her thin knees.
She was shivering.
She held a letter in her hand, which she presented to Marius.
Marius, as he opened the letter, noticed that the enormous wafer which sealed it was still moist.
The message could not have come from a distance.
He read:—
My amiable neighbor, young man: I have learned of your goodness to me, that you paid my rent six months ago.
I bless you, young man.
My eldest daughter will tell you that we have been without a morsel of bread for two days, four persons and my spouse ill.
If I am not deseaved in my opinion, I think I may hope that your generous heart will melt at this statement and the desire will subjugate you to be propitious to me by daigning to lavish on me a slight favor.
I am with the distinguished consideration which is due to the benefactors of humanity,—
Jondrette.
P.S.
My eldest daughter will await your orders, dear Monsieur Marius.
This letter, coming in the very midst of the mysterious adventure which had occupied Marius’ thoughts ever since the preceding evening, was like a candle in a cellar.
All was suddenly illuminated.
This letter came from the same place as the other four.